On Teaching, Mothering and Perfectionism

Bulletin board in my first classroom

Before I went to law school - what seems like a lifetime ago - I was a teacher.  Fresh out of college at the ripe old age of 20, I joined Teach For America and moved to Miami, Florida to start teaching middle school social studies.  I look back on teaching as the most challenging and most rewarding work I have ever done.  But at the beginning, the reward had not yet come.  Instead, it was pure challenge.  I remember vividly driving to the first day of school.  I had my roster already, of course.  I knew what was coming: nearly 200 (yes, that's right) eleven-, twelve-, and thirteen-year-old students.  In my classroom.  Under my care and instruction.  If they failed, it would be my fault.  My stomach was in nearly as many knots as when I actually was a middle school student. 

Very, very early in my teaching career, I realized what I found most difficult about it.  It was not the classroom discipline struggles.  Sure, there were plenty of those.  Yes, there were days I cried when the door closed behind the last student of the day.  Any teacher that tells you otherwise, I'll wager is lying.  But I had been well trained by Teach For America, I had an amazing support system, and those were challenges I was able to overcome.  Likewise, it was not the content.  Sure, it had been a while since I'd had to recall secondary social studies material, but after all, I had a fancy college degree (not to mention the teacher's guides with all the answers).  Content I could learn.  It was not the lesson planning, the grading, or the frequent evaluations by my administrators and Teach For America mentors, though those were all time consuming.  For me, the most challenging thing about teaching and the thing that kept me up at night was this: there was no measure of perfection. 

I'm going to go ahead and admit what will shock no one who knows me: I am a perfectionist.  And at that time in my life, I was used to doing things where there was a measure of perfection.  I was used to school, where I could get A's; sports, where I could win; piano performances, where I could get it right and receive awards.  I was accustomed to striving to be the well-defined "best" and usually coming pretty damn close.  Even getting accepted to Teach For America had been another example of this, as it was - even at that time - more selective than my undergraduate institution. 

Note from one of my students

But teaching was a whole new ballgame.  My success as a teacher depended largely on being able to motivate this group of young people - each with their own individual personality, learning styles and difficulties, personal struggles, and attitude - to try their very best.  My very best effort wasn't going to do it this time.  I needed those kids to work with me.  And I wasn't sure I knew how to do that.  I recall very clearly thinking: "Don't these kids know that if they all got up and walked out right now, there's not a single thing I could do to stop them?"  Thankfully, they apparently hadn't thought of that.  And they did try.  And together, for the most part, we did succeed.  By all objective measures in my two years with Teach For America, I was a very successful teacher.  And that's all good and well in retrospect.  But in the moment, it was very difficult to work day after day without that measure of perfection that, if I just worked hard enough, I could attain.

After two years, I went to law school.  Ah, the familiar world of academia.  There were fellowships to win, high grades to get, law review articles to publish, interviews and BigLaw jobs to land.  Objective measures of success.  Once again, whether I succeeded or failed was in my hands.  Either I would work hard enough, be smart enough, interview well enough - or I wouldn't.  But it was in my hands.  I did pretty well in law school - well enough to then complete a clerkship, get a couple of BigLaw job offers, and go to work in private practice.  Private practice brought its own set of challenges, but again I was largely in a world where one could strive for perfection.  Or if not perfection, at least objectively measurable success.  I could write without error, research until I found the answer, and work until I was the best prepared lawyer possible.  I could help clients, please partners, and win hearings.  Of course, I didn't win all the time, and the partners weren't always pleased.  But I knew what success looked like, and I could strive for it every day. 

A year ago, I left the practice of law.  Not for good, I hope, but for now.  My husband and I relocated (as we military families often do), and I got pregnant with our first child.  I knew I wanted to stay at home with the baby for at least the first few months (or years) of her life, so I did not look for work aside from the occasional contract gig.  And now, as planned, I'm a stay at home mom to an absolutely amazing baby daughter.  She is the light of my life, and - as any parent will tell you - I love her more than can be put into words.  But as much as I love mothering, it is also deeply challenging, even though I've only been at it a few months.  And when I really reflect on it, I think it is for the same reason that teaching challenged me so.  There is, again, no measure of perfection. 

Success will ultimately be measured by the type of daughter my husband and I raise - whether she is smart and kind and polite and happy and all those things we hope our children will be.  And someday, looking back, I hope to know whether we succeeded.  But that day is a long way off (truthfully, I wonder sometimes whether my own parents - with children ages 27 and 30 - believe they have reached that day).  Right now, I question everything I do.  And I mean everything.  Does she sleep enough?  Does she sleep too much?  Am I feeding her enough?  Should I feed her more often?  Is she reaching her milestones on time?  Do we talk to her and read to her enough?  Should we give her more independent play time?  Do we interact with her enough?  I have quickly discovered that one can drive oneself insane reading books and articles on the Internet about how one "should" be parenting and what one's baby "should" be doing.  And I am trying not to drive myself insane in that manner, but it's hard.  Because part of me (a big part of me!) always wants to look in those books and articles for objective measures of success. 

Truthfully, I think the only book I should be reading is a journal I received at my baby shower that now sits next to my bed.  In it, all of the wonderful women who attended my shower wrote their words of advice to me.  Though they each wrote individually, on separate pages, without consulting one another, a theme emerges from their writing: "Do what works for you and your family;" "Relax and enjoy;" "Try not to read too many books.  There are so many different opinions! Remember to listen to your heart;" "Love unconditionally - the rest will fall into place;" "You know what is best. Don't listen to others;" "Just remember not to listen to what all your friends say and go with your mommy gut, only you know what your baby needs."  All of those words were written by mothers.  Great mothers.  One, in fact, is both a mother and a doctor!   

That is the book I should read every day, because those are really the answers.  There is nothing objective, I am quickly learning, about raising a baby.  She cannot - or at least she should not - be measured by some standard in a book or against someone else's child.  Rather, she is my beautiful, smiling, babbling, one-of-a-kind baby.  Who I love.  Unconditionally.  Here's to letting the rest fall into place.